there really ARE people who make up entire delusionary worlds and interact with them the way Alex did in real life, often lasting much longer than four years.
The thing is, all of those people probably had a severe mental illness, which they were battling most of their lives, like schizophrenia.
But there are no evidence to suggest that Alex was mentally ill before the accident. And I never heard of a case where a previously healthy person went batshit after a trauma and lived in an imaginary world, with imaginary people for years.
They get PTSD, repressed memories or phobias, they get depressed or turn to addictions. But what Alex has done, goes beyond simply denying it happened or developing a fear of water or getting flash-backs. Alex went to "war" during which time he got imaginary letters from Margaret and Elle, befriended an imaginary merchant kid, Sgt. Nash and had a whole platoon of imaginary buddies. There, he was doing all sorts of war related activities including watching the said imaginary buddies getting blown-up and, apparently imagining an injury which made him loose the use of his legs.
If Alex had issues with mental illness all of his life I would have bought it, but he didn't. In fact, Alex was portrayed as a perfectly balanced, healthy individual before the accident, and with that in mind you can see that his delusions were simply too complex and long-lasting to be caused by one trauma. No matter how horrible that trauma was.
Take some rape victims for instance. Some of them are so disgusted with what has happened to them that they'll convince themselves and others that it never happened; effectively erasing it.
Erasing one traumatic event =/= living in an imaginary land for four years, with imaginary people and having imaginary injuries, with out any acknowledgment of the reality.
Study the human mind, it's a pretty complex thing.
I did, that's how I know Alex's crazies are a plot-device that has little to no basis in reality.
